Hotel redevelopment rejected by inspector

A hotel owner's plan to revamp a site has failed after a planning inspector turned an appeal down.

Knoll House Hotel, in Studland, Dorset, which is owned by Kingfisher Resorts Studland Ltd, would have been completely redeveloped if its planning application had been approved.

But Dorset Council refused it in January 2024 and planning inspector Hayden Bough-Jones further dismissed the appeal against the authority's decision last week.

Mr Bough-Jones said while he was in "no doubt" the current hotel needs regeneration, the proposed design would have damaged the Jurassic Coast World Heritage Site.

He said the hotel's current impact is "modest and localised" but that the planned change would have represented "a very different proposition to the lower-key existing development".

He also found that about 80 of 120 trees around the site would have been lost to the work.

Mr Bough-Jones concluded that, even with new trees, "there would be an enduring perception" that the redevelopment would have resulted in a complex that was "of greater scale [and] mass".

The hotel's owner said its application presented a "unique opportunity…to provide a high quality destination in the Studland area".

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